Irreplaceable {1}

Chapter 30

Leo had me in a meeting with an agent within a week. They met us at Leo's building in one of the boardrooms. I had a physical copy of my book printed out. It was still not done, probably about 85% complete, but here was an agent wanting to work with me already. I was very suspicious.

I was so suspicious that I had prewrote some questions to help catch them off guard.

"I am so excited to meet you, Marie. I really hope we can come to an agreement," the agent said. Leo was in the room with me as well and so was one of his lawyers.

I gave him a polite smile, "nice to meet you too."

The agent started the questions first, how much of the book was done. Genre and title? Favourite scenes? Where did I think it was going? Who was it aimed at?

He seemed confused that it was a sci-fi. Asked me about romance inside to see if there was any, there was not. I told him I used to write romance and I wasn't feeling it was the right direction to start my official writing career. If I started with romance, I would be treated as a joke when it came to sci-fi or fantasy if I tried to publish it later.

He did not like that, so I changed tactics and asked him my questions. The first one was, "how do you feel if I used a pen name?"

His face fell, and I had my full answer there. I did not care about the rest of the meeting.

After he left, Leo turned to me and laughed, "I saw what you did there. I like it."

"I want my books to be published because I'm a good writer, not because I'm dating you," I told him.

He grinned, "I totally agree. On to the next?"

"What?"

Leo didn't have just one meeting set up, he had six. We got to stop after the fourth for lunch and then we were back in it.

At the end, there was only one person I kind of liked. It was the fourth lady and she told me straight up that she would not make me any promises until she read the book. I emailed her the first ten pages to start and we were going to see where it went.

It gave me even more motivation to write the book and I ended up being attached to my laptop that whole weekend. Leo just laughed every time he saw me carry it somewhere or plug it in to a weird place, but he didn't say anything. Even at movie night when I sat at the dining table instead of on the couch with everyone during the movie.

Asha was still not back yet, and Levi looked like it was weighing on him.

By the time we had the listening party to hear the entire new album, I had signed a contract with that agent to get my book out there. She loved it and we were going to work together to find an editor I could work closely with to make it perfect and hopefully work with in the future if I had more ideas.

Someone we got along with enough for the long-term.

I moved into Leo's house then. Rowan just rolled his eyes as he helped me, but he was well on his way to saving for university and living his adult life so he was not worried.

At the listening party, Leo made sure I paid attention to the secret track he had wrote. It was a love song, which I had my suspicions before about. Leo sang his favourite lines to me and then grinned every time his voice said, "you are irreplaceable."

It made my insides melt.

No one bothered me anymore, not Jasmine or Dena, not Ethan or Dalton, and not my parents.

It was freeing.

When I signed the book deal, I emailed my work finally to let them know I was resigning because I had found other opportunities. Then we had a house party where my x-cubical friends came to celebrate. They finally explained that work was letting them know if they told me any information they would be also put onto unpaid leave and me leaving on my own terms set them free to be seen with me again.

My life finally felt like it was mine.

*~*~*~*

~One year later~         (ish)

*~*~*~*

Leo had big plans for our second year anniversary. To the point that I was pretty sure he planned the whole tour around it. Yes, the band was back on tour. It took them a while after they released that last album, all of them had some things going on, but they did it. And I went on tour with them.

Every city we went to, I went to book stores and signed my books. Marie Finch was there, right on the cover, and inside was a picture of me. They were my books. And yes, people read it because my name was on it and I was dating Leo, but they could not find a shred of either of us in there. I got asked the question every time I did an interview for it, and I had the same answer. "These characters are not me, they are not Leo, they are just products of my imagination."

People were crazy though, and that included Leo.

We were in Paris for our two year anniversary. Leo somehow got the schedule to line up to this and give us the day off to celebrate. We went on a few museum tours and then ended up on the top of the Eiffel Tower for dinner.

It was almost too much.

"I swear, if you propose to me up here, I will throw up," I told him. We had talked about getting married. We had already decided to spend the rest of our lives together, so that was not a problem. But Leo wanted to surprise me with the proposal and the rest of it. When I wasn't thinking it was going to happen, were his exact words.

Leo laughed, "no, that is cliche and would ruin the moment I think. This is just a happy two years."

We smiled at each other.

Leo waited until after the tour, when we were back home after a week or so. During our regular everyday lives to ask.

And of course I said yes.

*~*~*~*

THE END

Book two, coming soon.

***Teenage Hopes***